Last time I looked, speed is not well correlated with the frequency of accidents, but is with their consequences. And the single most effective road safety measure is grade-separated junctions (i.e. slip roads rather than one road directly joining another), because it reduces the difference in velocity between two colliding vehicles. Of course you can’t put those everywhere, but the way to stop people driving in town is good public transport, which nobody wants to pay for because they’re stuck in the mindset that it should make a profit.
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In Germany the no Tempolimit on the Autbahn thing is a major and contentious political issue.
There are several considerations: accident severity, accident frequency, traffic jam frequency, emissions.
Even the ADAC (the German drivers lobby association, think AAA in the US) says that a majority of people that were asked are in favor. This has held true for years now.
And yet … despite calls for the Tempolimit “we” are so in love with our cars and the idea of unlimited speed and the car industry being our Aushängeschild that it is impossible to change anything. Actually during the previous goverment one of the arguments against introducing a limit was “we don’t have enough signs to put up” which is really the dumbest of excuses. Not enough signs? You need far fewer signs when there is the same speed everywhere. Right now … lots of sections have various and inconsistent limits. Because in theory there is no speed limit but that theory only holds true for smaller and smaller sections of fewer and fewer routes that are not frequented by a lot of cars.
I have driven on various freeways in Italy, Greece, France, Switzerland, Austria, UK (driving on the left side of the road is just wrong), US and maybe others. Everyone has a speed limit. Except Germany. Everywhere people drive less aggressively and more civilly than here. German drivers seem intent on being right and proving it to others. There is a lot of “drängeln” (tailgating) at high speeds on the Autobahn. It is incredibly dangerous.
I felt safer in 4 lane traffic with left and right overtaking in Portland than I feel on a 3 lane German Autobahn where you are only allowed to overtake on the left.
Actually, I only ever feel safe on the Autobahn when there is so much traffic everything slows down.
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Holy cow what an adventure that was. Speed limits can’t save you from Greek driving.
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Sounds like Germany needs to adopt the most efficient/confusing speed limit sign from the UK:
(The National Speed Limit sign - it’s up to you to know what that is for the road and your vehicle)
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Love the fact it means you can do 60 (60!) along there!
No one in their right mind would, of course.
cough
Look, I was young and stupid OK?
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Grandfathered in from when the national speed limit was introduced in 1965; it had previously signified “no limit”. (1966 was the high water mark for peacetime road casualties in the UK, though to be fair they hadn’t yet introduced an alcohol limit then.)
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I was going to say that for Italy…
(My driving instructor had a tale about just driving down the centre of the road in Italy and when someone comes the other way you just… pick a side and hope for the best. And Seatbelts are unlucky so you shouldn’t use them.)
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It would probably be fine until you got to a bend and/or met a tractor coming the other way.
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Or a tank, as has unfortunately happened before now in some parts of England. Ends about as well as you would guess.
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I’ve always liked what they say about traffic lights in Italy:
In Milan they’re the law.
In Rome they’re a suggestion.
In Naples they’re christmas decorations.
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For anyone not familiar with UK roads, that’s not usually as difficult as it might sound, as if that’s the sign, and you’re driving a car, the limit is almost certainly either 60 (single carriageway) or 70 (dual carriageway).
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(Reaches for pedant hat…)
Well, technically 60 is the maximum allowable speed you can drive at, but only if it’s safe to do so.
(…Removes pedant hat)
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Nice straight road, no probs… 
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Here in Yorkshire, and in other parts of the country with similar traditional constructions, the ability of drivers to judge what constitutes a safe speed is recorded in the large holes battered through the drystone walls.
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I always like telling the story about how the police person waved me across a red light while we were on a vacation in Naples in 2011. Driving there is one of my most memorable driving experiences ever. My partner had temporarily lost his license due to German Autobahn Tempolimit Traps for 4 weeks and because he needed to drive to work we quickly booked a 2 week vacation and decided to be staying in Old-Town Naples for 2 weeks with a rented Fiat500 (new model).
The roads must have been paved by the ancient Greeks that first settled in the area. I swear the stones were that old. NO Asphalt in the inner city, no. The garage was at a 90° angle in such a tiny road I had to have someone park the car every single day. The old-town roads were so narrow that I could only drive at walking speed and my mirrors were regularly touching pedestrians who didn’t care.
Outside of the Old Town roads the traffic was … extremely busy. Obviously you were being overtaken by all kinds of smaller vehicles left and right weaving through the cars. Constant honking that felt more like “Hello I am here, how are you?” rather than the German “Get out of my way, imbecile!”
And yes going through a red light on the behest of the police.
The car had an automatic clutch but some of the streets were so steep I managed to stall the engine once.
Going up to the Vesuv and following the route suggested by navigation software was also spectacular: there is a winding road that tourists are supposed to take. But there is also one that’s more like a ski-jumping ramp: that’s the one we took.
Getting on and off the Tangentiale was an adventure in itself every time.
And driving across an impossibly high viaduct to visit Paestum was scary…
But Italian drivers are driving way more defensively… there is some kind of order to the chaos and I did better there than at home.
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Same in Bedfordshire. There’s been a rather nice looking SUV with its rear end poking out of a new gap in a wall on my commute for the last week.
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Can you get the make, model, and year of that? If it’s still rather nice looking after going through a wall, it sounds very well made! 
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Which would give a whole other (not to mention seedy and unpleasant) meaning to the word Abschleppwagen…
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Up until sometime in the early 2000s, passengers in Texas could be actively drinking from open containers. Unsure when exactly it changed.
The current status of open container laws among the states shocks me, though almost all of them are “prohibited for driver and passenger” (UK translation: passenger and driver)
Mississippi, apparently, has no law prohibiting a driver nor passengers from consuming alcohol.
A number of other states also permit passengers to have and/or imbibe while passenging.
The US Highways (“freeways”, a.k.a. “limited access highways”) near me are 70 mph (112.654 k/hr) with a higher speed of 75 (and 80, in some cases) allowed as you get farther from populated areas. They drop down pretty quick to 65 mph, 55 mph, and even 45 mph in places as you travel into the city center.
A few years ago, I was working about 30 minutes away from where I lived, and I took a US Interstate freeway most of the way between home and work; I would regularly drive 75 and 80 mph on these stretches, and was very comfortable doing so.
Now that I work from home, I drive very seldom and, when I do, typically not on freeways. So now when I get on a 75mph highway, it feels very fast.
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Schlepper is also a tractor variant.
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